Best in the world? They're all bunnies to me, says Glenn

Page Tools

The embarrassment of riches lined up at Melbourne's Federation Square yesterday presented Glenn McGrath with an unfamiliar dilemma.

There, in his cowboy boots, was Andrew Flintoff - undoubtedly, in the great Australian fast bowler's opinion, the best cricketer on the planet at the moment.

There was Brian Lara appearing as cool and composed as ever and Rahul Dravid and Jacques Kallis looking dapper in their dark team suits.

Just as their captain, Shaun Pollock, had not yet decided who would bat in what order when the Rest of the World meet the best in the world at Telstra Dome from tomorrow, McGrath found himself unable to continue his tradition of singling out a target for the series ahead.

"It's hard to target one, isn't it, so I might have to target the whole team," declared McGrath with a smile.

McGrath's English targets - Andrew Strauss and Michael Vaughan - each prospered at different times during the Ashes, but normally he is phenomenally successful at choosing his bunny ahead of time - the batsman he considers the most dangerous in the opposition team, or the captain - and working his way into his thoughts. Lara and Kallis have both been targeted in the past.

"A match like this, I'm not even considering that," McGrath said.

"I'm just looking forward to the challenge of bowling to the guys who are classed the best in the world. You knock over the top two or three and then you've got guys like Lara and Kallis, and I think they bat down to number eight at least.

"It's a pretty awesome batting line-up and I do enjoy bowling to the guys who are classed the best in the world."

The veteran, whose untimely slip on a stray cricket ball on the first morning at Edgbaston badly damaged Australia's Ashes fortunes, has no intention of abandoning his other pre-series practice - of predicting a clean Australian sweep - no matter how critical former Test captain Steve Waugh was of some of the big statements that emanated from the Australian camp at the start of the Ashes campaign.

McGrath boldly predicted a 5-0 series series victory to Australia, and incidentally was not on his own after the tourists' 239-run win in the first Test at Lord's, but by the end of the tour he had the Barmy Army's taunts, reminding him of his prediction, ringing in his ears.

"I've been asked if I was eating humble pie and the crowd gave me a pretty hard time, but if you look at every other series I've played in the last eight years, I've said we'll win one-nil, two-nil, three-nil, five-nil depending on how many Tests," said McGrath, who followed up with a typically bold, if tongue in cheek, statement: "We're looking to win these one-dayers three-nil and the Test match one-nil."

McGrath added: "He [Waugh] is pretty frank, he says it how it is. Obviously we could have bowled better, could have batted better, could have done all the basics better than we did, so when you're not 100 per cent on your game, things are going to be said.

"I think Stephen should know how I work as well as anyone, and every Test match he was captain I predicted we were going to win it as well."

McGrath - the leader of the famed Fast Bowling Cartel - will head a new-look Australian attack in the Super Series and beyond, after Michael Kasprowicz and Jason Gillespie were cut from the national team and, yesterday, young slinger Shaun Tait was ruled out with a long-term shoulder injury.

"I think it's pretty important for us to bounce back now and play some decent cricket, get a few more wins on the board and get back to business as usual," McGrath said. "This is where the season starts for us now, leading into the West Indies and South Africa Test matches."